As I mentioned in my post yesterday, my father was recently diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer's at age 60. My grandma also passed away from the disease about 10 years ago so you could say my family has been greatly affected by this horrific disease. It has been the most difficult thing I have had to deal with in my entire life. However, there has been a silver lining. I do now have the gift of knowing not to take time for granted. I have a friend whose dad died of a brain aneurism when he was in his teens. Basically his dad was healthy one day, and the next day...gone. I can't imagine how difficult this would be and i hope to never find out. What I'm trying to say is I am very fortunate that I am 30 years-old and get to spend quality time with my dad.
On the flip side, the hardest part of this is knowing what the future holds having seen my grandma go through it. One way I have dealt with it, poorly I might add, is going with the out of sight, out of mind mentality. In a way I sometimes pretend that it isn't happening. Well today, for my act of kindness, I decided to change my method of coping. Today I became a champion for Alzheimer's for my act of kindness. Basically what that means is I will get weekly news updates and calls to action to help fight the battle against Alzheimer's. I will also be participating in a Alzheimer's walk in Madison in September.
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